Goodbye to Taiwan: The Rainbow moves on...

Bula again everyone. This is my last blog from the Rainbow Warrior. I just want to reminisce about what has transpired during this first part of the East Asia Ocean Defenders Tour in Taiwan. First of all I just want to state what a beautiful place Taiwan is, it's truly 'Asia's best kept secret ’. Also the people are so friendly and of such generous spirit. I also want to say what a privilege it is to be onboard the Rainbow Warrior on one of its last voyages before retirement this year - with the exceptional men and women onboard who perform well above the call of duty bestowed upon them. The campaign team as well has been awesome on this ship tour. Also it’s a wonderful feeling to be onboard a vessel with people from all over the world with different backgrounds, languages, way of life and yet have one clear goal in mind: standing up for our planet and in this instance our Pacific Ocean.

Defending our Oceans in Taiwan

The Rainbow Warrior is on a tour of East Asia - highlighting the urgent need to protect ocean life in the Pacific from destructive industrial fishing fleets and create marine reserves - areas of ocean off-limits to fishing and other industrial activities. Greenpeace East Asia has joined with local Taiwanese groups to call attention to the plight of our last tuna stocks and urge the Taiwanese government to support efforts to defend our oceans and better regulate its tuna fleet - one of the world’s largest.

Sometimes it feels as if these are impossible tasks because there are seemingly overwhelming barriers in our way. The huge corporation behind the scenes, ineffective legislation and offices that don’t want to implement it, corrupt officials and practices and a thousand more.

But I love what Mahatma Gandhi once said ‘ First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win. On the blackboard in the Rainbow Warrior someone wrote that they are fighting us now so these must mean that however bleak the outcome of the battle is now, victory for our oceans is within sight. It takes exceptional commitment and courage to be involved in battles such as these.

So we go on with our campaign and we invite people from the Pacific and the world to stand with us. Bon Voyage Rainbow Warrior and Greenpeace, Go You Good Thing! The ship will go to Hong Kong over the Chinese New Year to continue its campaign before calling into South Korea. Another significant fishing power of the region.

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(Unregistered) Benjamin
says:

Hello Ronetava,

First I would like to thank you for your encouraging and inspiring blog...

Writting to you from South Korea-Jeju Island where we have here an urgent situation to deal with...
We are struggling against the militarist expansion on a rare biodiverse coral rift classified "protected area"by the Unesco...
As the US and Korean armies are building a naval base and are on the point of covering this precious natural treasure with ciment... to park their war ships later.

Now we saw that Rainbow Warrior is in South Korea and we would like to contact the captain or anybody responsible on board in order to let them know the terrible situation here.
That has been already a four years struggle...we are still determined to stop the destruction of that rare site.

Please do you have any advice that could help us to contact anybody on board of the Rainbow Warrior directly?